This is the point in the year when cooking gets a seat on the back burner. Yes, there are dressings to be made and the odd bit of grilling here and there, maybe even a fruit tart to be put together, but never has 'take one onion' felt less appropriate. Unless of course they are salad onions, in which case you will need to take five of them.

Dinner in the open air simply wasn't an option till early July this year, a loss of a good 60 outdoor meals on last year. I intend to make up for it. This week we moved into high-summer cooking, weeks late, but who is arguing when there is a roasted pepper and tomato salad on the table? Salads that have been sulking in the rear are suddenly taking a more visible role as principal dish.

I spotted ripe peppers at the market on Saturday, and yellow tomatoes. I have learned to be suspicious of the larger golden tomatoes - they often disappoint. These, however, promised well from the start, their skins taut and shiny, their stems thick, hairy and with a deep herbal scent to them. The peppers grilled, skinned and dressed with olive oil, sea salt and perky parsley, and the tomatoes tossed with crushed summer (mild) garlic and black pepper, this cheerful orange and green salad became the first meal of deep summer. It felt like breathing in a warm sun-baked breeze. We padded it out with toasted ciabatta and fat anchovies.

Bruschetta is coming into its own now. Young garlic is juicy enough to allow you to follow the essential instruction to 'rub the toasted bread with a cut clove of garlic'. Summer, before the new season's bulbs have dried, is the only time this really works.

If you don't feel like cooking rice or potatoes at the end of a hot day, then a thick slice of toasted bread, the outsides charred nicely on a smoky grill, is the thing to go for. A curl of air-dried ham with milky cheese and green olives is good here (I suggest Taleggio cut quite thick), as are thick pieces of smoked salmon and a dressing made from dill and thick yogurt. Toasted rye bread is very flattering to a dill herring. Top it with thin slices of mild pink-skinned onion.

Spring onions, so cheap I never grow them at home, are good on the grill. Their green leaves turn particularly sweet and mellow. I bought three bunches last week, which seemed a lot at the time, but when grilled they only did two of us, served on toasted sourdough with thin shavings of Berkswell, flat-leaf parsley and olive oil. Use the vegetable peeler for this and other firm cheeses. Berkswell makes a nice change from Pecorino and currently has a distinct fruitiness at the finish.

The sunshine puts me in olive-oil mood. Not just a drizzle or a gulp but a bowl of deepest-emerald oil in which to dunk bread, raw carrots, cucumber or whatever I have to hand. I have been tasting olive oils this week. So many modern ones are either raspingly peppery or greasy in the mouth that it was a pleasure to sample the new Spanish oils from Brindisa. Dauro de L'Emporda has a light freshness to it that goes well with summer salad leaves and yet has enough clout to stand up to a bean salad. It is made mostly with Arbequina olives and has become my most used oil this summer.

The lighter, less astringent oils seem more appropriate to what one might call 'sunshine food'. Fruity oils flatter peppers, and tomatoes and are good with robust salad leaves such as rocket, mizuna and mustard greens. The hot oils are too much for any leaf with a hint of mustard to it. I planted some spicy leaves in shallow seed trays this year - the saw-edged green-in-snow and a peppery landcress have done especially well, the latter being a pick-your-own watercress for townies.

I have found a way to stop the snails getting at my greens. Pick them within a week or two of germination, before they go out into the garden proper. They will germinate on a cool windowsill if there is not too much direct sun. There's beetroot, both yellow and the more usual Bull's Blood variety; mibuna and mizuna (one smoother leafed, which is a godsend if you also have rocket and frisee in your salad bowl - too many spiky leaves in a salad and you feel like a donkey munching on thistles), and some cos like Reine de Glace, which is currently battling to find itself a bit of shade. I don't even bother with a dressing sometimes. Just dig into the salad bowls with my hands and eat the mismatched leaves with my fingers.

I have taken to keeping a cut-'n'-come-again salami in the fridge. The close-textured meat, cut into fine slices or matchsticks, is often the savoury element you are looking for in a salad. It's a good thing to add to a salad of waxy-fleshed potatoes such as the excellent Linzer, a yellow potato that holds its shape neatly even when saturated with dressing. A little thick-cut cucumber and a spot of mustard and dill in the dressing, and you have a meal for a cool summer lunch.

When I became enthusiastic about buffalo mozzarella some 10 years ago, I had no idea the soft, cool, wobbly cheese would become ...#8594;...#8592; an obsession. Barely a week goes by without there being some on the table in one form or another. It is valuable with hot leaves such as watercress and young mustards. This week we had it in pencil-thick slices with seedlings of shiso - the mildly aniseed-scented red perilla, earthy baby chard, green olives and a ballsy olive oil. The hotter leaves work best, and rough-edged rocket or mizuna will add a welcome change of gear from the uber-soft cheese. Don't even think of buying anything that isn't made with buffalo milk.

Other things that have enjoyed each other's company this summer have been raw broad beans and Serrano ham (getting a bit late now unless you can find some very small beans); ricotta, fennel and cold lamb, an undemanding mixture of crusty-edged leftovers, crisp vegetables and gentle cheese; smoked chicken (such a boring eat if you don't add a chirpy salad or decide to have it straight from the fridge) with a side order of yogurt, grated radish, cucumber and mint; mackerel and horseradish, the fish grilled till crisp outside and the horseradish grated and stirred into whipping cream.

Further afield, I saw some of the best ruby chard I've ever seen. Bright, stiff-stemmed and with ruffled red-veined leaves, it was one of the few hot vegetables I ate this week. I used to cook the leaves separately from the stems, but this isn't necessary if you don't mind slightly crunchy stems. In a shallow pot of lightly salted water, it is ready in four minutes.

Serious cooking has been off my radar this week but I did make a very good ice on Thursday by putting a vanilla smoothie in the ice-cream machine with a punnet of ripe raspberries I had crushed with a fork. The pink ice cream, or perhaps it should be called frozen yogurt, was delicious with a few whole fruits thrown over it at the table. I wish there had been enough for a cornet, too.